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Lauryn Hill was the target of a lawsuit from her Fugees bandmate, Pras Michél which alleges that the celebrated rapper and singer breached a contract that sank plans of a reunion tour among other claims. Lauryn Hill fired back with comments herself, shooting down Pras Michél’s claims immediately after.
Variety exclusively reports that Pras Michél filed the lawsuit on Tuesday (October 1) in federal court, alleging instances of fraud and a breach of contract in connection to a 2023 tour featuring all three members of the Fugees which includes Wyclef Jean.
From Variety:
In a scathing lawsuit, filed Tuesday in the Southern District of New York, Michél alleges that Hill grossly mismanaged the setup, marketing and budgeting of their scuttled 2023 tour, which “was actually a veiled and devious attempt to make a big score for herself,” the complaint states, adding that the singer then secretly siphoned off money from the tour guarantees. The full list of claims also include breach of fiduciary duty and refusal to permit an audit of the Fugees’ tour.
After the report was published, Lauryn Hill issued her version of events via a statement to the publication:
In a statement to Variety, Hill calls Michél’s suit “baseless” and “full of false claims and unwarranted attacks.” The Grammy-winning artist adds that Michél’s complaint, filed Tuesday in the Southern District of New York, omits that her former bandmate “was advanced overpayment for the last tour and has failed to repay substantial loans extended by myself as an act of goodwill.” (Michel’s suit does note that he did not make money on the 2023 tour that was canceled due to Hill’s vocal strain and instead is in the hole for $900,000 in unrecouped expenses.) In her statement, she adds that the 2024 tour, which was canceled by Live Nation days before it was scheduled to kick off, “was being planned whether the Fugees were involved or not.” (Michél’s suit claims that his and fellow co-founder Wyclef Jean’s involvement was a stipulation made by Live Nation.)
The publication examined the finer details of Michél’s lawsuit, with a claim stating that Hill turned down $5 million for the Fugees to perform at Coachella. The lawsuit adds the reason Hill shot down the offer was that No Doubt received top billing over the group.
The Fugees were set to hit the road earlier this summer but the tour was suddenly cancelled just days before it was set to kick off.
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Pras Michel sought a retrial in connection to his conspiracy case after noting that his former legal team used AI to offer a closing statement in the matter ahead of his 2023 conviction. A federal judge has since ruled that Pras Michel will not receive a retrial, despite findings that suggested errors were made.
As reported by The Haitian Times, U.S. District Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly decided on August 30 that Pras Michel’s request for a retrial would not move forward. In 2023, Michel was convicted on several charges and sought to have a new trial due to his former attorney, David Kenner, employing AI to write a closing statement but later discovering the mistakes the program made. One of those mistakes includes an incorrect attribution of Michel’s lyrics given to Sean “Diddy” Combs.
In the motion filed by Michel’s attorneys, the rapper’s legal team uncovered 14 errors that were made during Michel’s time and court thus the filing of the motion for retrial. The legal team additionally argued that the jury overseeing the matter was influenced by statements made by two federal judges that named Michel as a co-conspirator in the crimes he was charged with.
The judge in the case did note the errors raised by Michel’s team and three of them were considered according to accounts. However, the judge decided that the issues raised were not enough to overturn the jury’s initial ruling.
Pras Michel faces a potential sentence that could land him 20 years in prison. He is currently free on bond. A date for his sentencing has not been announced.
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Source: Steve Jennings / Getty / Pras / The Fugees
After calling out his fellow Fugees member in a lackluster diss record, Pras is now walking back those subpar bars thrown at Lauryn Hill.
The Fugees are widely regarded as one of the most iconic Hip-Hop groups of all time, they have also earned the reputation of being a hot a** mess, thanks in large part to the shenanigans going on, mainly Lauryn Hill’s pretentious behavior.
Pras had time for Lauryn Hill, dropping a diss record called “Bar Mitzfa” following the not-so-surprising news that The Fugees were canceling tour dates.
On the song, he chimed in on the frustration rapping, “Don’t blame me, blame her, she made the mess / Not another fucking penny is what I told ‘Clef.”
Now, in a new interview with Vulture, he is throwing cold water on the song, claiming it’s “not a diss track, but more of a family dispute.
“You’re family, you have internal disagreements, but it’s not going to be on a level where I’m dissing her — that doesn’t make any sense,” he said. “Artistically speaking, sometimes we say things because that’s how we express ourselves. This track is me speaking my truth. When I was writing the record, those lines just came out.”
He also acknowledged the fan’s frustration with Lauryn Hill, saying, “They are paying their hard-earned money to see you.”
In the same breath, he claims he is stunned to see Hill receiving so much backlash for her behavior.
“I’ve never seen this kind of fan reaction toward Lauryn Hill,” Pras said. “There is a rejection — ‘We help to pay your bill. Just like we should be happy you came, you should be happy we coming.’ This dynamic is a two-way street. It’s tough love. But this is not an indictment of her and her character. All people are complaining about is lateness.”
Pras Confirms Lauryn Hill’s Lateness Is An Issue
Like many, Pras also confirmed they are victims of Hill’s tardiness penchant.
“There’s obviously reservation,” he said. “We don’t even ask her if she’s gonna be on time anymore; we say, ‘How late is she going to be?’ It gets to a point that you say, is it even really all worth it?”
Ahead of Pras releasing the song, The Fugees announced tour date cancellations in the United States. To further kill whatever goodwill she had fans, Ms. Hill said the negative media coverage following previous show cancelations and her always showing up late were the reasons behind poor ticket sales.
Pras, who has legal issues to worry about, says he intends to be a part of the shows that will take place during the European leg of the tour.
We shall see.
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Source: Steve Jennings / Getty
Days ago it was reported that The Fugees had suddenly canceled their U.S. tour dates just days before they were set to hit the road. Now, it seems like one of their members has something to say to his fellow Fugees bandmate.
According to TMZ, Pras has just released a new record in which he takes direct aim at Lauryn Hill for who he feels is the reason The Fugees continue to be dysfunctional in the eyes of their fans. Dubbed “Bar Mitzfa,” the new song finds Pras immediately airing out his grievances about The Fugees situation spitting, “Still waiting for me to lose, don’t hold ya breath/They took a bite out of his ambizzy, I control the rest/Don’t blame me, blame her she made the mess/Not another f*ckin’ penny is what I told Clef [Wyclef Jean]…”
With word that the cancellation of the tour was due to lack of ticket sales, it seems like Pras isn’t too happy with the reputation that Lauryn Hill built for herself over the years such as arriving hours late to her own shows and canceling performances out of the blue.
TMZ reports:
We’re told the song was recorded sometime last week, when Pras needed to blow off steam … on the heels of low ticket sales shutting down the legendary hip hop trio’s reunion plans.
Remember, Pras agreed with fed-up fans that Lauryn’s reputation for being late and missing shows justified them boycotting the concerts.
You gotta think, Lauryn’s lateness also jams up his and the band’s schedule … not to mention any invited celebrity guests at the shows!!! After a while, everyone starts to treat the tour like a big joke.
As much as we love The Fugees, we know that copping a ticket to their shows is basically a 50/50 gamble on whether or not it will start on time or even happen at all. And we all know why that is (no shots).
That being said, Pras has skipped his own share of Fugees performances, but with all the legal setbacks he’s faced over the years, y’all know he might’ve needed this tour paper more than his fellow “Fugee-La” members. Just sayin’.
How or even if Lauryn Hill (or Wyclef) will respond to this cut is anyone’s guess, but had this been 1999, it would’ve been the talk of the town. Now, in 2024? Meh.
What do y’all think of Pras taking shots at Lauryn Hill? Sound off in the comments section below.
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Pras Michel is currently battling charges of working as a secret agent for the Chinese government, which could land the Fugees star several years behind bars. However, after a mid-month special hearing, Pras Michel might have a glimmer of hope that a retrial is underway as he awaits sentencing.
In a new article from Vulture, it was revealed that Judge Colleen Kollar-Kotelly oversaw a three-day hearing for Pras Michel and his new legal team to present a series of questions to the rapper’s former attorney, David Kenner. Michel is accusing Kenner of dialing it in while representing Michel, including a claim that the attorney used AI to write a closing statement.
Kenner, despite it all, says he tried his best to get Michel cleared of the charges and even supported his former client’s hopes of gaining a retrial.
“I’m on Team Pras,” Kenner said on the witness stand during the hearing earlier this month. “I did not think he should have been convicted. I hope he is granted the retrial he seeks.”
The hearing revealed that Kenner, 81, hired a medical malpractice lawyer to oversee the matter but that the gentlemen refused to attend any of the trial happenings due to not wanting to leave his pit bulls at home in Minneapolis. Instead, the attorney told the outlet that his dogs are aggressive and said that he’d be able to perform his tasks from home.
The fact that the judge overseeing the matter called this hearing suggests there is some credence to Michel’s new claims that Kenner did not represent his client correctly and possibly violated his constitutional rights.
“She’s a careful and smart and fair judge,” Paul Pelletier, a former Justice Department prosecutor, shared with Vulture. “Calling this hearing was the fair thing to do, given what she observed during trial.”
Kenner found fame after defending the likes of Suge Knight, Snoop Dog, and the late Tupac “2Pac” Shakur. Kenner was able to get Snoop Dogg acquitted of murder charges in 1996. It should be noted that beyond Kenner’s Hip-Hop credentials, he is an attorney of considerable notoriety but it appears that his health and unorthodox methods were a bad cocktail for Michel and his legal needs.
Pras Michel isn’t out of the woods yet as the judge is still set to issue a ruling at a later time but it isn’t readily known which way the pendulum will swing.
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Pras Michel and his legal issues are still hanging over his head but on Wednesday (January 10), he entered a new hearing with a new legal team. The Fugees rapper is now represented by a new legal team featuring Doug Jones, a former senator who represented Alabama.
As reported by Vulture, Pras Michel, 51, was convicted on 10 counts of connected to a conspiracy to influence the Chinese government in Washington, D.C. nearly nine months ago. He has since fired his former attorney, David Kenner, who Pras has accused of using AI to write the rapper’s closing statement in his earlier trial.
According to the outlet, the hearing for today isn’t typical and suggests that there could be a retrial or acquittal of the previous convictions, this is due to the prosecution’s alleged mishandling of the case and Kenner’s defense tactics.
Before working with Doug Jones, Pras hired new lawyers to handle the Kenner issue and toured for much of the latter part of 2023 with his Fugees bandmates as part of Lauryn Hill’s 25th-anniversary tour in connection to her debut album, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill.
Jones made his mark as a civil rights attorney and was the federal prosecutor who helped convict two members of the Ku Klux Klan for the 1963 bombing of a Birmingham church that killed four Black girls in 2020 and 2021.
The hearing this week will focus on Kenner, who once represented Snoop Dogg in 1996 and aided the popular rapper and pitchman in dodging murder charges. Michel’s side argues that Kenner, 82, was not up to par to represent Michel, especially in a case of that magnitude.
“Upon reviewing the record of Mr. Michel’s previous trial, questions have emerged about the consistency and fairness of the legal process,” shared Michel’s publicist, Erica Dumas, in a statement.
Kenner is expected to take the stand and explain his side while facing accusations of using AI to write Michel’s closing argument statment.
Pras Michel is still awaiting sentencing on the previous conviction but plans to hit the road again with the Fugees this March, according to sources close to Vulture.
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Pras Michel and his ongoing legal issues are far from nearing a solid conclusion after the Fugees rapper and entrepreneur requested a new trial via an explosive claim. According to a new report, Pras Michel claims his former attorney used artificial intelligence in his closing argument during the trial earlier this year that ended in the Haitian-American’s conviction.
As Politico reported, Pras Michel, who was convicted in April on several charges including witness tampering, acting as an unregistered foreign agent for China, and conspiracy, alleges that his former defense team used AI to create his closing argument in that earlier trial.
From Politico:
In a withering motion filed Monday night with a federal judge in Washington, Michel’s new attorneys argued that his Los Angeles-based lawyer David Kenner relied on the fledgling technology at critical points in Michel’s trial, contributing to “prejudicial ineffective assistance of counsel.”
Kenner “used an experimental artificial intelligence (AI) program to draft the closing argument, ignoring the best arguments and conflating the charged schemes, and he then publicly boasted that the AI program ‘turned hours or days of legal work into seconds,’” Michel’s new defense team from D.C.-based ArentFox Schiff wrote. “It is now apparent that Kenner and his co-counsel appear to have had an undisclosed financial stake in the AI program, and they experimented with it during Michel’s trial so they could issue a press release afterward promoting the program — a clear conflict of interest.”
A former publicist for Michel added that Kenner allegedly admitted that “AI wrote our closing,” which former federal prosecutor Peter Zeidenberg shared in a declaration that went with the current defense team’s motion.
Pras Michel joined his Fugees bandmates on Tuesday (October 17) for the start of a reunion tour in support of the 25th anniversary of Lauryn Hill’s acclaimed solo album, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill.
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Pras will be joining his Fugees brethren for a nationwide tour in support of Ms. Lauryn Hill’s 25th anniversary of her debut album. The rapper and businessman was recently spotted in California and was asked about the upcoming tour and if new music was on the horizon.
As reported exclusively by TMZ Hip Hop, Pras, real name Prakazrel Michel, was in Beverly Hills when a reporter from the outlet got in some questions regarding new music from himself or his Fugees brethren. The Haitian-American star was more focused on the upcoming tour in support of The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill turning the big 25.
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According to the outlet, Pras learned about the band getting back together again via TMZ Hip Hop and is now focused on creating a good set for the fans that will come out in droves for sure.
The “Ghetto Superstar” artist is facing federal charges and while he was largely mum about the case, he did share with TMZ that he’s retained new counsel and is hoping for a positive outcome in the matter.
Check out the exchange below.
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Source: Tasos Katopodis / Getty
Pras has been found guilty of conspiracy to defraud the United States, amongst other charges. The founding member of the storied rap group the Fugees allegedly got his hands dirty with corruption across the presidencies of Barack Obama and Donald Trump.
CNN reports that on Wednesday (April 26), Pras, 50, born Prakazrel Samuel Michel, was found guilty of 10 criminal counts that stem from an international conspiracy involving the US government. The charges all derive from Pras’ financial relationship with a Malaysian businessman named Jho Low and using his influence in the aid of the Chinese government to acquire access to US officials. Said officials got their pockets lined in attempts to gain favor with Trump and Obama.
The case drew attention due to Pras’ fame as an artist and then acquired extra scrutiny from social media recently when he seemingly admitted to being a federal informant while on the stand. It’s a claim his legal team denies.
Pras testified that Low gave him $20 million back in 2012 for the rapper to get a picture of himself and then President Obama. However, prosecutors say Pras took $800,000 of those funds to donate to Obama’s campaign on the low—no pun intended. Then in 2017, Low again got Pras to donate funds to Trump in order to urge the dropping of an investigation into his financial dealings. Pras defense was that it was his money to spend and that the $100 million the feds claim was for Trump influence was actually an investment to start a new media company.
Clearly, the jury called cap.
“We are extremely disappointed in that result but are very, very confident in the ultimate outcome of this case,” reportedly said Pras’ attorney, David Kenner, to reporters. “If we do move to a sentencing hearing I remain very confident we will certainly appeal this case. This is not over.”
Pras is facing more than 20 years in prison when he is sentenced at a yet undetermined date. As for Low, he’s reportedly somewhere in China.
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Pras, also known as Pras Michel of Fugees fame, found himself at the center of a global conspiracy case where it became assumed that the rapper became an informant to the FBI. While that fact is currently being debunked by Pras’ legal team, that hasn’t stopped Twitter from roasting his Fugees bandmates Wyclef Jean and Ms. Lauryn Hill with John Forte catching strays in the process.
Pras Michel was recently in Washington to take the stand in his federal conspiracy trial where he faces up to 22 years in prison for allegedly involving himself in a global money laundering scheme and working with a foreign nation to influence U.S. government matters.
Pras did admit on the stand that he spoke with FBI agents regarding his connection to Malaysian financier and fugitive, Jho Low.
After examining the case further, Michel is actually on trial because he took Low’s money to the tune of millions and reentered a portion of those funds into President Barack Obama’s 2012 reelection campaign and then attempted to ask the Trump Administration to move away from investigating Kow and extradite Chinese businessman, Guo Wengui who was connected to former Trump ally, Steve Bannon.
Hip-Hop Wired also received a statement this week from Michel’s legal team correcting the perception that their client turned informant.
From the statement:
Simply stated, if Pras had been an informant for the government, he wouldn’t be on trial right now. The government does not prosecute and threaten its informants with more than two decades of jail time.
Pras never was an “informant” for the FBI.
Nothing could be further from the truth, and the reckless suggestion that he was an informant carries life-threatening implications in hip-hop circles.
During a portion of Pras’ nearly two days of testimony last week, Pras described from the stand a decision he made a handful of years ago to approach the FBI in regard to a narrow issue related to his wider case.
In law enforcement parlance, an “informant” is someone who works directly with an investigating law enforcement agency either to cut a deal for him or herself, or with the direct interests of that law enforcement agency as part of their own agenda.
As it stands, Twitter won’t care about all of that legal mumbo jumbo and is always hellbent on getting those jokes off. We’ve got some of them listed below.
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